The Formulas for Failure: "But I Thought it was Going to Be EASIER Than This!"
Although I am no hardcore anarchist or Libertarian, I've pretty much always been interested in variations of "independence" and "freedom" as those relate to life and finding ways to work (aka "earn a living") outside the conventional mainstream of life.
The World Is Filled with Great IDEAS!
I watch a lot of projects "come to market" with great fanfare and enthusiasm... and they do, indeed, have lots of promise. I look at them, examine the idea, and think to myself "Yes, this really has some potential."
Colorful flowers
And so, I can totally appreciate why some hopeful entrepreneur starts them.
However, then I watch as many of them quietly disappear... the "shine" seems to wear off as the originators and developers of the idea discover that it is actually a lot of work to turn something into a viable and long-term successful venture. And so... they quit. Maybe because it's a lot of work. Or maybe-- as one young entrepreneur told me-- "it's just not fun."
Maybe I am just very "old school" here, but here's the thing-- a lot of the time, the projects themselves are still good... it's just that the group of people who are running the show had this notion that "success" should be easier than it actually is.
I've written on variations on this topic before, as it relates to Steemit and reaching blogging success here.
Great success with little effort is an extreme rarity
But the thing is, we hear about these instant successes and then we get the idea in our head that "easy success" is the standard by which things happen.
Close-up of Lavender blossom
Personal observation tells me that this simply isn't so. There are lots and lots of "good" ideas out there-- even a few "great" ones-- that end up going nowhere simply because their developers had expectations that success would come fairly simply... and wouldn't involve relentless grinding work to come to fruition.
And yet?
Many successful businesses are more the result of someone's very determined stick-to-it-iveness than having a particularly brilliant and revolutionary idea. In the end, the people left holding the fat bank bag are the ones that stuck with something, rather than abandoning it when the going got hard.
One line of reasoning I hear a lot is "Yeah, but I was DEPENDING on this to work! I needed the MONEY!"
Really? I'm sorry to be harsh here, but if you were "depending" on something to make money quickly when it actually is a project/idea that realistically would take 2-3 years to stabilize, then there is nothing wrong with the idea itself, and everything wrong with your piss-poor judgment.
Banking on becoming "the exception" to a well-established trend is ill-advised unless you have a lot of patience and very deep pockets.
Steemit and Blogging Success
Pretty much daily, I come across dozens of posts talking about "how hard it is for minnows" to get seen on Steemit, and how "troubling" it is that people are giving up and leaving because they are not enjoying success here.
What exactly were you expecting?
Watch Sunsets!
Phrased a little differently, when you started your twitter account, or created a Facebook page for your hobby or interest, did you either (A) magically have 10,000 followers within a month or (B) give up after a few weeks because (A) didn't happen? Or did you spend years building those accounts?
So now you're on Steemit, and there are "rewards" involved... so you're supposed to suddenly enjoy instant success?
I'm, sorry but DOES. NOT. COMPUTE.
I have done pretty well for myself here on Steemit with this blog NOT because I expected some magic "it" to manifest success, nor because I "got lucky" with the right Whale upvotes at the right time... but because I have relentlessly posted content I hoped might be of some interest with people and then socially interacted with the site.
Over 10,000 times, as of last count. Over a period of a year... and I am still working on it!
So whatever your project, just have some patience. Odds are you have a good thing, you just need to give it adequate time to develop!
How About You? Do you tend to start things with enthusiasm and then discover they are "more work" than you thought? Or do you have pretty realistic expectations? Do you tend to be patient with projects you get involved with? Have you ever quit something and then wondered if you'd have succeeded, if only you'd given it more time? Leave a comment-- share your experiences-- be part of the conversation!
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(As usual, all text and images by the author, unless otherwise credited. This is original content, created expressly for Steemit)
Created at 180213 10:13 PST
I think it’s rather normal to have that new “I’m happy to be here and do this thing.” I tend to use this new found enthusiasm towards new and different things as a way to try and gain some traction. After such placebo effect wears most that is when most people tend to crash and burn. It should just be expected.
I go into things knowing what ever expect amount of time and effort will fall short of what it will take. It is an expected outcome so I go in knowing this. Even when I try and predict how much of these things it will take I understand it will be off the mark.
I expected things like Steemit to take at least 1-2 years’ worth of being consistent and putting in some amount of effort just to try and get somewhere on it. I was not an early arrival and many people with show up late with large built audiences elsewhere will get a boost past me with very little added effort. Now if they can keep that is up to them.
Am I where I expected to be here? Yes and no. I’ve lacked consistence and effort as other times take priority in my life so I’m just here in spare minutes when I find them. As such it will take every longer but I already know I lack the track record of dialing in timeframes to get somewhere on things.
To many risk it all on one thing thinking that will make the difference. They seem to think “no one wants it more then I do.” There are some crazy people out there who work themselves to death. It’s not a good mindset to have and without balance you get easily tilted in life.
I expect part of my urging people to "have patience" with their ventures stems from the fact that I tend to be fairly measured in terms of what I get involved with; I tend to do a few things, rather than flit around from this to that and back again. Which might sound slightly weird, given that I have lots and lots of diverse interests...
20+ years ago I was somewhat involved in Network Marketing, and one of the things I learned from a mentor was how to look at "systems" and "programs." In the vast majority of cases, it's not a matter of whether "the program" works, it's a matter of whether or not YOU work. Of course, most people who are on the hunt for some secret "money for nothing" solution really don't want to HEAR that.
When I got here, I "made a deal with myself" that I would take about a year to see if this was something I wanted to stick with... and beyond that, my time frame was 3-5 years. I wasn't one of the earliest arrivals, either, but I figured I could still establish a solid presence here before "mass adoption;" were such a thing to occur. Based om results-to-date, I feel pretty good about continuing to invest time and effort here, and slowly building some "equity" (SP) in the community.
Building a great foundation to stand on before mass adoption is often the key. I noticed the barrier to entry to get noticed in newer arrivals is increasing quite high.
I'm not sure how far off we are but it seems to be creeping up on us. I even joined a nice little community and seeing how fast that is growing is just amazing.
Being part of a community can definitely be advantageous. I belong to Steemit Bloggers and it grew so fast they capped membership at 300 in an effort to keep it so we mostly would all know each other.
Yep, I tend to start things with enthusiasm and then discover they are "more work" than I thought. Sometimes I abandon them and sometimes I don't. It depends on the rewards/enjoyment ratio.
I'm just wrapping up a drop shipping business which, after 18 months of hard grind was finally turning pretty lucrative, but I didn't enjoy it at all so I decided to get out before I got attached to the money and it became harder to walk away. As it is, it's taken me since November to fully decide to let go of it.
As I've mentioned before Steemit is definitely hard going than I thought it would be. I think I'm getting a bit more used to that now.
It's hard when you're first here and see other people making good money without much effort (I think that's where the expectation comes from) but you gradually begin to see that they have either been here a long time or have invested in the platform.
So far the enjoyment of the conversations I'm having and the new stuff I'm learning is easily a big enough compensation to keep going.
Businesses you have invested a lot of time and effort in can be hard to let go of. I tend to err on the side of "holding on too long," rather than the opposite.
Drop shipping businesses can be hard because there are so many people trying to do something similar, so the profit margins are often small, and it takes a long time to get truly established.
I really had no expectations of Steemit when I came here... pretty much every bit I get here I consider a "bonus," compared to Facebook or keeping my own external blogs.
Absolutely right! Patience and hard work=success!
Yup. And then we can plug in "realistic expectations" somewhere, and it seems like a winning mix!
Thank you @denmarkguy. You are an inspiration to me and really motivate me. I totally agree with your assertions..
I have been working my butt off here at Steemit for nearly 2 months now. Making cents and a dollar or two here and there but that is just part of the process.
If it was easy everyone would be doing it :)
Of coure the fact that I love it does help indeed. For sure
But it takes a long term commitment of work, work, work !! No question.
And to be successful you really have to embrace that !
Again thank you for this post
Well, you make an important point there: "If it was EASY, everyone would be doing it!"
And that's pretty much where I always suggest people stop and have a reality check. People talk about things they see and say "You can make $20000 a month doing this!" and I am immediately suspicious... because if you really COULD make that much sitting at home clicking a few buttons on your computer... life as we know it would not even EXIST.
Thanks for the nice comment!
I can’t give you a surefire formula for success, but I can give you a formula for failure: try to please everybody all the time.(micheal hyaat)
Also very true. It's important to stay true to yourself.
Awesome view of success. Thanks for appreciate. I also think success is dependent on wise decision and work right track. So steem will be a part of success so far.
coool
Right some color is appreciable.
Many staggering weights in life to succeed.
your post always helped me alot of new thing to learning in our life.i read your post attentively this time. i am learning of success. thats a valuable post for me.thank u very much gor ur good post. @denmarkguy